Jerry,

>Slashdot is already unimportant, since there are more serfties there than Pinquins lurking /., or so it seems in the last couple of months since Ballmer and Mundie started bashing and FUDing Linux and GPL.

Yeah, that stuff did bother me...I still think Mundie and Jim Allchin are fricking brainless turds.

>Bashing MS? Well, no... not any more than you do when you post opinions favoring MS.
>
>As far as lost rights are concerned there are many (just read a recent EULA to see what you cannot do) but, how about this one: If your company tests MS product A against 3rd Party product A', and the tests are not favorable to Microsoft's A, then try to post them on a company Internet website without Microsoft's permission. But, since Microsoft started this practice other third party software companies have followed suit, hence the claim that "everyone is doing it".

I haven't read about this...I am sure that all gets pretty nasty and hairy, and for as much money as MS makes (plus 30 bil in cash), they do seem to whine an awful lot.

>BTW, did you see that little story about MS and a select group (major) PC manufacturers completing a meeting in Las Vega to standardize a PC product on Windows XP? I predicted that in this forum a month or so ago. It will be the complete deal: A WinPC (what I called it) booting directly into a pay-per-use PassPort server, running HailStorm pay-per-use software. No Passport account/connection? No operation. Each machine will have an unremovable GUID and it will be attached to every outgoing piece of Internet traffic.

OK...MS has every right to try to develop a commercial product based on such things...

>Based on WinPC I made another prediction: Microsoft will start giving away free WinPC's if a 3 year subscription to PassPort (and it's pay-per-use additional fees) is purchased. For those folks, in all countries, that can afford PassPort subscription fees and pay-per-use-fees, it will spell the end of the General PC (one on which any OS could be installed) and the deligation of Linux to a hobbist status, until genera PCs wear out. Excpect to see free WinPCs by Xmas!

You are probably right. But demise of the PC? I think not... Now, if MS uses their monopoly power to _force_ all major PC makers to market and sell _only_ these WinPCs, or if they set the price so low as to run conventional PCs out of business, then I will be worried, and I will watch as the DOJ nails MS for predatory pricing and monopoly leveraging. The Appeals court may have ruled to not split MS, but they did rule that MS _did_ break the law. I assume that no matter what penalty is eventually leveled at MS, one stipulation will be a close watch on their future moves (since now they have been officially deemed a monopoly, even by the appeals court).

>I also predicted that MS will push/promote/buy legislation to outlaw General PCs because they represent a threat to "Intellectual Knowledge", copyrights and patents.

Um, well, that is one prediction that will _never_ come true (are you saying it has?) I am as paranoid as the next guy, but there are just as many huge companies as MS out there (IBM, HP, etc.) that have just as much clout to prevent this. Remember, the market drives profits...you really think MS can unilaterally say "we will now only sell WinPCs, and all OEMS will go along with it"...? Long before they will get away with that they will face:

- scorching by the DOJ
- scorching in the marketplace by consumers and corporations alike that will refuse to hand over all control to a single, proprietary company
- scorched by their own common sense when they realize they can't keep gouging folks this way

>I will further predict that PassPort rates for users in Socialists and impoverished 3rd World countries will be minimal or free, because rates on users in 1st World countries will be higher in order to pay for access by 3rd World countries. This is how Gates will defeat Linux in those countries. Pure Socialism. That's why rulers in Socialist and poor countries will approve. (And they accused Linux of being Communistic! :)

How will that defeat Linux? Linux already _IS_ free. And these PCs you talk of...are they going to be locked down so that I can't put _anything_ else on them? That's absurd. Even completely proprietary boxen like a Dreamcast have been hacked so that they can run Linux (including XWindows) famously. How do you propose that MS will lock down these WinPCs so hard as to make sure they are used for nothing else? They can't do this because they don't make hardware...only software... Now, if Apple were taking over the world in this way I might be scared, but I hardly think that's going to happen... *grin*

>So, from a Window User's point of view the world is coming up Roses, as long as Bill keepts the rates down. How he will do that and maintain his standing as the world's richest man remains to be seen.

Right, it comes down to what it has always come down to...rates and functionality. If MS does offer a subscription service where users can have everything they want in a platform (speed, apps, flexibility, future functionality, and cheap), then it will sell. If they don't deliver, it won't. As for the worries about WinPCs taking over the world and all other companies and OEMs blindly tagging along, well, I don't buy it. Heck, two years ago Micheal Dell stated flatly in interviews that Linux was nowhere on their radar screens and it would never be something the customer would ask for. Now I can get a Dell PC loaded with Linux right off their factory floor. What makes you think things are going to start going more in MS's proprietary direction?

JoeK